A Long Winter’s Night – What’s a Sibling For?
Posted By Randy on December 24, 2012
This is a tale from a Christmas Eve long, long ago.
I grew up with a younger sibling – a sister three years younger than me. As the oldest child, and a son at that, I was raised to be responsible, respectful, steadfast, and true; and it took. My sister, on the other hand, was raised to be coddled and taken care of. That took too. I saw this as a mistake, and grew progressively more exasperated by my lack of success in convincing those in command that my arguments had any merit.
For example, if I asked my parents if I could stay up later than the established 9:00 PM bedtime to watch a half-hour television show, and they told me I needed to wait until I was a little older before I could do that, I accepted the pronouncement without argument. However, when that magic day finally arrived with every expectation of my basking in the rite of passage that came with being … you know … of an age, it immediately became apparent that my much younger sister had somehow achieved it as well. I considered this a travesty of justice, the parental explanation for which was, “She’ll cry.”
I resolved from this, and similar injustices, to take matters into my own hands. Quietly so on my part, although certainly not on hers. If I had to describe my philosophy of sibling rearing in those days, I think the best would be if you can’t teach them respect, teach them fear.
Certain dark aspects of the house I grew up in have previously been described in an LFM episode that you may enjoy by clicking here. I made sure my sister knew all the stories, suspicions, and superstitions – the ones I’d heard, and the ones I’d made up. Most conveniently, until our Father renovated it when I was in my mid-teens, the house was like a doughnut, so one could pass counterclockwise from the living room, into the foyer, down a short hall past the dreaded basement door, to the kitchen (off of which lay the Parental Boudoir – the only room that didn’t double as a thoroughfare), thence through the bathroom, into my bedroom and finally to that occupied by my sister. As inconvenient as this may seem, it fit my plans perfectly, particularly since no door of any substance barred the way between my sister’s room and mine.
If I were to get into every subtle nuance of her education at my hands, it would dilute the entertainment value of this evening’s revelry, so I will limit myself to describing one practice I employed sporadically so as to keep her on her toes, and applied only when I had decided she needed a tune up. I came to call this (privately) “The Face”.
I would wait until I knew she was asleep before taking my flashlight and creeping into her room. Slowly, and with the utmost stealth, I would arrive at the point where I was stooping over her, nearly touching noses, before assuming a crazed expression of big eyes and lots of teeth, and then turning on the flashlight while giving her a nudge. That one never got old, and best of all, by the time her shrieks awoke our parents I was in my own bed feigning slumber. Ah, sweet justice.
But my sister was not merely a spoiled child. She was a greedy child, and there is no better – nor worse – venue to demonstrate greed than the secular celebration called “Christmas”.
Christmas was a big deal in my family, and while my sister and I were young it included not only what came from our parents and local clan, but also incredibly huge and lavish presents sent to us by relatives in Montreal. They were always eagerly anticipated and appreciated, but then one Christmas I noticed my sister was behaving as though what she and I received represented the spoils of some sort of popularity contest. This I would not have.
Now, you have to understand that my sister had bought hook, line, and sinker, into the philosophy that Santa Claus goes abroad in the land on Christmas Eve, bringing toys and other goodies to all the entitled children in the world. He knows when you are sleeping, he knows when you’re awake; he knows if you’ve been bad or good, but for the entitled it doesn’t matter because it’s all good.
Another thing you have to understand is that there was a door in my sister’s bedroom, leading to a closet wherein the family ironing board, vacuum, and a few other regularly needed items were stored. On the door was a full length mirror in which my sister could see herself when in her bed. Most important of all, through that closet, from bottom to top, ran the old brick chimney, in the side of which was a black cover the size of a large pie plate that sealed the opening to which a stove pipe had once attached. I made sure my sister came to know this to be the only entrance to the house that led from the chimney, and so her Yule tide doom was sealed because we all know how Santa gets in.
Patient child that I was, I decided to let it go a year after sewing the seed, having learned just that Christmas day that the night before, my sister had lain awake most of it with both eyes riveted on her reflection in the mirror affixed to that door, ready to shriek and bolt at the first sign of sideways movement in her reflection. You may think this a strange fear for a child awaiting her just deserts to have, but such was my dark skill that I had, by then, completely demonized Santa Claus, and my only regret is that I had not yet heard of Krampus.
The next year found her older, calmer, and ever so slightly resistant to my pre-Christmas mind games. Slightly, yet not enough for her to notice on retiring that a length of fishing line ran from the closet, passing thence behind her desk and dresser, and on into my room. Bedding down, she knew nothing of the line’s attachment to the now carefully positioned ironing board that had been relocated inside the closet so that it stood in line with the mirrored door. Her breathing told me the time was right as she reached the edge of sleep.
I drew the line tight.
There was a thump as the ironing board toppled forward to rest briefly against the inside of the closet door, and then the door moved! Slowly at first, but ever faster, until it unleashed its shadowy contents into the room to fall with a resounding bang onto the floor at the foot of my sister’s bed. After a moment’s silence, I peeked into the room to find her at the head of her bed, knees drawn up under her chin, with eyes as big as dinner plates.
I’ll finish with a fragment of a commemorative poem that I’ll finish one day.
There came a thump, and nothing more.
At least not right away.
But ’twas enough to draw her gaze
As gravity held sway.
She knew not why the door swung forth,
Nor what it hid within,
But as it moved, her guilt awoke
And tallied every sin.
So when the door flew open wide,
And freed the ironing board,
The message of its crashing down
Was nought to be ignored.
And though she came to know the truth,
That I’m the one to blame,
Each Christmas Eve that closet door
was never quite the same.
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wow! You really ARE a sick, sadistic fellow. I should not laugh at this. But I MUST, there is no controlling it. It is hysterically funny. I wonder if your sister remembers those days with a fond smile. You must ask her when you next visit her in the asylum.